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Query: UMLS:C0020538 (hypertension)
 170,190 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Highlights of papers presented at an international symposium on advantages and risks of oral contraceptives, and the details of the results of 2 studies are discussed. 1 study compared the effects of a combination of 30 mcg of ethinyl estradiol and 150 mcg of levonorgestrel with a reduced dose 3-phase combination of these hormones; it involved 489 women with 2777 menstrual cycles for a 6-month period. No pregnancies occurred. Missed menstruation occurred in 0.9% of the cycles with the 3-phase combination, contrasted with 2.3% of the 30/150 mcg combination group. Bleeding disorders were more frequent in the 30/150 pill group (15.7% vs. 10.1%). Spotting occurred in 8% of cases in both groups. The 3-phase pills proved to be safe and were preferred because they caused less bleeding. Another study compared the effects of 2 Swedish-made contraceptives by administering Neovletta (N) to 50%, Trionetta (T) to 25%, and Trionetta 28 (T 28) to another 25% of the 862 women with 6472 menstrual cycles who participated at 12 family planning centers in Sweden. T and N contain the same amount of estrogens, but T contains 40% less gestagen than N. The T 28 treatment also included 7 placebo tablets. Results showed that only 1 pregnancy occurred in the T group, despite a high rate of failure to take the pills (8.1-9.4%). Menstruation was normalized in both the N group (90.4%) and the T group (94.2%) reaching the normal 28 (+ or - 2) days cycle. Missed menstruation occurred in 0.6% of the T group as opposed to 2.3% of the N group. There was a significant difference in spotting and irregular bleeding between the 2 groups: 6.3%-15.8% for N and 3.0-9.0% for T. Also, there was a higher rate of bleeding problems for T 28 than for T. 8.6-8.8% of women in both groups quit the experiment because of complications, e.g., bleeding, nausea, headache, and hypertension. Both pills proved to be reliable and safe, but the new 3-phase preparation, T, is recommended because it does not reduce the beneficial HDL cholesterol as does N.
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PMID:[Report from an international symposium about advantages and risks of oral contraceptives. Amsterdam, March 1982]. 692 Nov 98

The role of the endothelin-B receptor (ET(B)) in vascular homeostasis is controversial because the receptor has both pressor and depressor effects in vivo. Spotting lethal (sl) rats carry a naturally occurring deletion in the ET(B) gene that completely abrogates functional receptor expression. Rats homozygous for this mutation die shortly after birth due to congenital distal intestinal aganglionosis. Genetic rescue of ET(B)(sl/sl) rats from this developmental defect using a dopamine--hydroxylase (DBH)-ET(B) transgene results in ET(B)-deficient adult rats. On a sodium-deficient diet, DBH-ET(B);ET(B)(sl/sl) and DBH-ET(B);ET(B)(+/+) rats both exhibit a normal arterial blood pressure, but on a high-sodium diet, the former are severely hypertensive. We find no difference in plasma renin activity or plasma aldosterone concentration between salt-fed wild-type, DBH-ET(B);ET(B)(+/+) or DBH-ET(B);ET(B)(sl/sl) rats, and acute responses to intravenous L-NAME and indomethacin are similar between DBH-ET(B);ET(B)(sl/sl) and DBH-ET(B);ET(B)(+/+) rats. Irrespective of diet, DBH-ET(B);ET(B)(sl/sl) rats exhibit increased circulating ET-1, and, on a high-sodium diet, they show increased but incomplete hypotensive responses to acute treatment an ET(A)-antagonist. Normal pressure is restored in salt-fed DBH-ET(B);ET(B)(sl/sl) rats when the epithelial sodium channel is blocked with amiloride. We conclude that DBH-ET(B);ET(B)(sl/sl) rats are a novel single-locus genetic model of severe salt-sensitive hypertension. Our results suggest that DBH-ET(B);ET(B)(sl/sl) rats are hypertensive because they lack the normal tonic inhibition of the renal epithelial sodium channel.
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PMID:Salt-sensitive hypertension in endothelin-B receptor-deficient rats. 1074 72